29. She was a mother who lost a son in Bush's illegal war. She turned their 'noble cause'

claims upside down when she demanded an answer from Bush as what was that noble cause and he refused to answer. She went off their carefully managed script and was the first to do so, as a victim of the war, undoing all their propaganda.

There is no one who could have done the job better and even the MSM could not ignore her.

She took the smirk off Bush's face and showed him for what he was, a swaggering, faux 'hero' who did not have the guts to face the mother of one of his victims. The Emperor had no clothes and no one, up to that point, had more effectively demonstrated that.

59. Her name is Concepcion

and she has been there since 1982. I don't know her whole story buy you can google the White House Protest Lady or something like that to get more info on her. We thought she was both remarkable and adorable.

24. Yes, I do. I feel the protest was right but she was the wrong person. She even managed to have

marriage problems over the situation. But your and the others are great to stand by her because you feel positive about her so you should. I don't feel positive about her. I'm sorry I wish I could feel different but I don't. Like I said right cause, wrong person.

31. You know what? I don't have to explain myself to you or any other person here. I don't like

her. That is good enough reason for me. You have an opinion and I have mine. I am not trying to change your opinion. I don't like her, she was a pushy loudmouth person and I just didn't like her. Period. It is my personal feelings.

40. A lot of people think she wasn't the right person.

Also worth noting: a lot of people think that men who speak out are heroic or brave, while women who speak out in exactly the same way are whiny, unfeminine, or pushy.
A lot of people prefer men as leaders in general.
A lot of people prefer that women in the public eye meet some kind of porn/model standard, and if they look like "normal" real life women they should stay at home.

I suspect if she had been a deceased soldier's father and looked like JFK and done everything else exactly the same, there would be an entirely different attitude about her. We say we hate privilege, but many of us are still attracted to it in some form.

47. It's likely she "had marriage problems"

because she has as dead son. Loosing a child can do that to a couple.
I met her in Crawford. She was a genuinely nice woman. She was doing what she did because of her child. I saw the sorrow in her eyes and believe me, I know the look.

12. I took this picture at her camp

13. I was there too.

support for the war was something like 66% for it. Then after the encampment and the following protest in DC, the numbers pretty much reversed with about 66% now being against the war. Cindy Sheehan and the war protesters became the most dangerous thing to the *regime's dominance.

I personally believe we stopped the draft. Seems like they were starting to nudge into that direction but the whole anti-war movement put too much spotlight on it and they backed off.

45. Warped view of history

As others have pointed out, she was far from the first. And the support for the war was already in the tank before she had her protest. The levels of disapproval in June 2005 are the same as they are now. I supported her at first, but she gradually became more and more extreme and turned off many who were on her side, much less those in the middle. I don't have feel anger towards her, just sadness.

56. Don't forget to credit OWS with the civil rights movement while you're at it.

58. Cindy called herself the First Occupier when she spoke...

to the assembled marchers at the 'Occupy the Rose Parade' event in Pasadena on January 02, 2012. I haven't searched but there should be some Youtubes and Livestream of it online.

As for the W years, Cindy was a one-note activist, but her timing was impeccable. She was camped out in Crawford for weeks, drawing the world's press to the Bush vacation site. Katrina struck during late August of 2005. While she was still camped there, if I recall.

It helped show the world how ineffective that President was - hiding in a 'ranch' dodging the press and eventually just heading off to John McCain's B-day party.

65. I had not thought of Cindy in a while

Interesting that you should mention her right now, Will.

I just finished Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. It was assigned to my high school son by his English teacher, and I was a little surprised. Then I remembered that I was asked to read Dalton Trumbo's Johnny Got His Gun when I was in high school and the Viet Nam war was still going on.

So I picked up a new copy of Johnny and found that Cindy Sheehan wrote the forward to the recent edition. It is wrenching to read. It brought back so much anger and guilt and helplessness that I had pushed down and forgotten. While I've been blithely raising my two sons to young adulthood the last seven years, Cindy was still mourning her lost one.

I think a lot of people recoil from Cindy (as one said above "she rubs me the wrong way") because she forces us to face how angry and helpless we were, and are, about Iraq.

66. Nowhere near the first

I do agree that her technique of standing in witness to something very wrong is the same - but I think that she follows in a tradition of peaceful protest that has been used throughout our history and the history of the world.

I do not know US history well enough to know the first, but I can list earlier attempts that used the idea of camping out to make your plight and opinion known. Here is a link that speaks of the Army ejecting war veterans who were demanding a promised bonus payment that could have helped them as the country fell into depression - http://www.historynet.com/the-bonus-army-war-in-washington.htm

Many of the civil rights actions were similar - and their quiet dignity in the face of repression was amazing.

As to trying to change the course of a war, there was the Dewey Canyon encampment in DC that was led by John Kerry. Now before you say that it doesn't count because it was shorter, you might consider that the pre announced end actually enabled it to be successful, because they controlled their story's end, while getting their message out.